L.B. "Jeff" Jeffries (James Stewart) Gunderson,
how did you ever get to be such a big editor with such a small memory?
Gunderson By thrift, industry, and hard work--and, uh, catching the publisher with his secretary.
Jeff I get myself half killed for you and you
reward me by stealing my assignments.
Gunderson I didn't ask you to stand in the
middle of that automobile racetrack.
Jeff You asked for a, something dramatically
different. You got it.
Gunderson So did you.
Gunderson It's about time you got married,
before you turn into a lonesome and bitter old man.
Jeff Yeah, can't you just see me, rushing home
to a hot apartment to listen to the automatic laundry and the electric
dishwasher and the garbage disposal and the nagging wife...
Gunderson Jeff, wives don't nag anymore. They
discuss.
Jeff Oh, is that so, is that so? Well, maybe in the high-rent district they discuss. In my neighborhood they still nag.
Stella (Thelma Ritter) The New York State
sentence for a Peeping Tom is six months in the workhouse.
Jeff Oh, hello, Stella.
Stella And they got no windows in the workhouse.
Stella We've become a race of Peeping Toms. What
people oughta do is get outside their own house and look in for a change.
Yes, sir. How's that for a bit of homespun philosophy?
Jeff Readers Digest, April 1939.
Stella Well, I only quote from the best.
Stella You heard of that market crash in '29? I
predicted that.
Jeff Oh, just how did you do that, Stella?
Stella Oh, simple. I was nursing a director of General Motors. Kidney ailment, they said. Nerves, I said. And I asked myself, What's General Motors got to be nervous about? Overproduction, I says; collapse. When General Motors has to go to the bathroom ten times a day, the whole country's ready to let go.
Jeff She's too perfect, she's too talented,
she's too beautiful, she's too sophisticated, she's too everything but what I
want.
Stella Is, um, what you want something you can discuss?
Stella Look, Mr. Jeffries, I'm not an educated
woman, but I can tell you one thing. When a man and woman see each other
and like each other, they oughta come together--wham!--like a couple of taxis
on Broadway, and not sit around analyzing each other like two specimens in a
bottle.
Jeff There's an intelligent way to approach
marriage.
Stella Intelligence! Nothing has caused the human race so much trouble as intelligence.
Stella When I married Miles, we were both a couple of maladjusted misfits. We are still maladjusted misfits, and we have loved every minute of it.
Jeff Would you fix me a sandwich, please?
Stella Yes, I will. And I'll spread a little common sense on the bread.
Lisa Carol Fremont (Grace Kelly) describing a dress. A
steal at eleven hundred dollars.
Jeff Eleven hundred? They ought to list that dress on the stock exchange.
Jeff She's like a queen bee with her pick of the
drones.
Lisa I'd say she's doing a woman's hardest job: juggling wolves.
Stella You'd think the rain would have cooled things off. All it did was make the heat wet.
Jeff She sure is the "eat, drink and be merry"
girl.
Stella Yeah, she'll wind up fat, alcoholic and miserable.
Stella Maybe one day she'll find her happiness.
Jeff Yeah, some man'll lose his.
Jeff I just can't figure it. He went out several
times last night in the rain carrying his sample case.
Stella Well, he's a salesman, isn't he?
Jeff Well, what would he be selling at three o'clock
in the morning?
Stella Flashlights. Luminous dials for watches. House numbers that light up.
Stella He's gonna run out on her, the coward.
Jeff Sometimes it's worse to stay than it is to run.
Thomas J. Doyle (Wendell Corey) Jeff, you've got a lot to learn about homicide. Why, morons have committed murders so shrewdly that it's taken a hundred trained police minds to catch them.
Jeff Are you interested in solving this case or
in making me look foolish?
Doyle Well, if possible, both.
Jeff Well then, do a good job of it.
Doyle One thing I don't need is heckling. You called me and asked for help. Now you're behaving like a taxpayer.
Lisa Where does a man get inspiration to write
a song like that?
Jeff He gets it from the landlady once a month.
Doyle What do you say we all sit down and have a nice friendly drink too, hmm? Forget all about this. We can tell lies about the good old days during the war.
Doyle Oh, Jeff, if you need any more help,
consult the yellow pages in your telephone directory.
Lisa Oh, I love funny exit lines.
Jeff I wonder if it's ethical to watch a man
with binoculars and a long focus lens. Do you, do you suppose it's ethical
even if you prove that he didn't commit a crime?
Lisa I'm not much on rear window ethics.
Jeff Of course, they can do the same thing to
me, watch me like a bug under a glass if they want to.
Lisa Jeff, you know, if someone came in here,
they wouldn't believe what they'd see.
Jeff What?
Lisa You and me with long faces, plunged into despair because we find out a man didn't kill his wife. We're two of the most frightening ghouls I've ever known. You'd think we could be a little bit happy that the poor woman is alive and well.
Lisa Why would Thorwald want to kill a little dog? Because it knew too much?
Lisa Oh, Stella, your choice of words!
Stella Nobody ever invented a polite word for a killing yet.
Stella Let's go down and find out what's buried
in the garden.
Lisa Why not? I've always wanted to meet Mrs.
Thorwald.